A world of troubles sparked his film
The seed that sparks any piece of art is often easy to find. What becomes fascinating is how that seed mutates over time.
Take the evolution of the new film "The Busker," by first-time writer-director Stephen Croke . It's set in an unnamed city near Boston (it was shot in Lowell, Croke's hometown), and centers on a sweet romance between two young teens: a white boy named Seamus -- a talented violinist following in the footsteps of his father, an Irish immigrant musician -- and a black girl named Ruby, whose rainbow-colored clothes and perky disposition are the sunshine that make Seamus bloom. But life is complicated: Seamus' s family has been shattered by racial violence, which makes Ruby's skin color a problem for his family and friends.
The spark for the film, Croke says, came when he was backpacking in Northern Ireland after college in the early 1990s. "The Catholic-Protestant troubles were still pretty heavy, and all the British troops were patrolling the streets with guns," he says. "People were carrying on like this was an everyday occurrence, because it is over there." A boy about 10 years old came up to Croke and asked to have his picture taken with him. Afterward , "he just kind of bopped off, in a very happy-go-lucky way, and the seed was, wow, look at this kid, with all this stuff going on -- who's watching him? Where's his family?"
Children that autonomous were new to Croke. "I come from a very large family -- I'm the youngest of nine and I have lots of nieces and nephews who are very well taken care of," he says. "Seeing a little boy like that was eye-opening."
Croke says that a few years later, he was working in a Los Angeles restaurant when he and four co-workers were held up at gunpoint. He had a gun to the back of his head and was kept for 2 1/2 hours before the armed men left. Both were black.
"After that, whenever I came in contact with black people, I had this really weird feeling," Croke says. "And I'd never had it before: I had friends that are black, I had a black roommate. But I started getting these really weird feelings."
And so the script he was working on, which was originally set in Ireland, shifted to Boston, and instead of religion as the central conflict, the tension became race. Alex Alexander, a student at Dartmouth Middle School at the time, was cast as Seamus. The effervescent Ayla Rose Barreau , who has since graduated from the Cambridge School of Weston, was cast as Ruby. The film was shot in late 2002 and early 2003.
Croke kept an Irish flavor where he could. The soundtrack features music by Luka Bloom, Áine Minogue , and Hothouse Flowers, and Hothouse singer Liam O'Maonlai appears in the film as Seamus's father. Boston singer Chris Trapper also has a cameo, and a song by Trapper's band, the Push Stars, is included.
Croke lives in Londonderry, N.H., and is working on a distribution deal for the movie. But for now, "The Busker" is getting its Boston debut Friday at 6 p.m. at the Museum of Fine Arts. Croke will be at the show for a post-screening Q&A. The movie also plays Saturday at 3:45 p.m. and next Sunday at 10:30 a.m.
Information about the screenings is at 617-267-9300 and mfa.org/film . For more on the film, go to thebuskerthemovie .com .
THE X/Y FILES: Actor David Duchovny has bought the film rights to Somerville author Pagan Kennedy's most recent non fiction book, "The First Man-Made Man," Kennedy reports. The book is about Michael Dillon, the first person ever to have a female-to-male sex change. The
Kennedy says Duchovny intends to produce a film that will star his wife , Téa Leoni , as Dillon. Leoni's current movie is "You Kill Me," with Ben Kingsley, which opens nationally next weekend.
"The deal proves that Téa Leoni has guts," Kennedy says by e-mail. "Dillon transitioned from female to male, and then from uptight British aristocrat to a dharma bum in India. So the part requires someone who can portray all of those transformations and yet also stay in tune with the core of Dillon's personality, the beating heart that remained unchanged underneath the dresses, suit jackets, and monks' robes."
And Leoni? Kennedy says she's "a terrific fit -- she's amazingly versatile." She'll also, Kennedy says, "look super-cute doing it."
SCREENINGS OF NOTE: The Brattle Theatre is hosting the Boston premiere of a restored 35mm print of Gus Van Sant's first feature, "Mala Noche," a sort-of gay love story (as only Van Sant would do it). According to the Brattle, the movie has never been properly distributed in the United States and only been available on bootleg copies. It opened this weekend and is playing daily through Thursday ( 617 - 876-6837 and brat tlefilm.org ).
The Coolidge Corner Theatre's Science on Screen program brings "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan" to its big screen on Monday at 7 p.m. The guest speaker is Dr. Jeffrey Hoffman , who as a NASA astronaut in the 1980s and 1990s, made five space flights and four spacewalks, including emergency service to the Hubble Space Telescope. Hoffman currently teaches aeronautics and astronautics at MIT (617-734-2500 and cool idge.org).
On Thursday , the Coolidge is launching its first outdoor film series. The show will take place on the lawn of the Larz Anderson Auto Museum at 15 Newton St. in Brookline, not far from Jamaica Pond. This summer's theme: cars. Thursday night's show is "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang," and there will be food for sale and vintage cars on display. The movie will get started around 8 p.m. Bring a picnic but leave the alcohol at home (617-734-2500 and coolidge.org).
Also: "Manufactured Landscapes," a documentary about Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky , is at the Museum of Fine Arts for seven shows starting Friday at 8 p.m. (617-267-9300 and mfa.org/film).
Leslie Brokaw can be reached at lbrokaw@globe.com. 
